Teens Define Themselves in Terms of Positive Traits; Adults More by Social Roles

Indeed, this is the first time that teenagers’ own self-generated descriptions of themselves (what the researchers call their “self-images”) have been gathered in a systematic way. A few gender differences were apparent: girls tended to provide more self-images than boys; girls more often described themselves as a daughter (relative to how often boys described themselves as a son), as being a sibling, a friend, mentioning their appearance, as tired, caring, love, shy, or quiet; whereas boys more often described themselves as a sports player and sporty. The researchers also compared the teenagers’ self-images with those obtained in an earlier study from a sample of predominantly young adults (aged 18 to 30).

Source: digest.bps.org.uk